We eventually arrived in Istanbul at 10pm after setting off at 9am from Cappadocia. The trip was long and pretty boring, with only four of us on the 26 seater bus it was very roomy and we chatted with our new kiwi friends Stu and Sarah.
On our way were were suppose to stop at Ankara and see a well known museum but the Turkish bus driver had a mind of his own and decided that would not be the case . . . . our FEZ leader phoned another guy who spoke Turkish to the bus driver commanding him to turn back and take us to the museum. We eventually left the motorway and headed back, after 45 minutes the bus driver headed back to the place were we had got off the motorway and shook his head gesturing that he could not find it. We ended up giving up and told him to drive to Istanbul.
We hit a bit of traffic coming into Istanbul and found it amusing that as all the cars crawled along, the entrepreneurs were taking to the motorway, they were trying to sell everything from food to emergency cell phone chargers.
We checked into a hotel which was really nice! We booked it last minute so got a reasonably good rate.
Also, it has to be said in Istanbul and the rest of Turkey there’s an exceptional number of stray cats and a few dogs too.. The cats are friendly enough as they’re used to people but they scavenge around the rubbish bins in packs of at least 3-4.
DAY ONE
Day trip out to Gallipoli from Istanbul.
We left Istanbul at 6.30am on a minibus with one other girl from Tasmania, headed to Gallipoli. After 5 hours of driving we stopped for lunch at 12ish then headed onto the Gallipoli Peninsula for our tour with the rest of the FEZ group who were carrying on around Turkey.
Our first stop on the tour was the Gallipoli museum. It was a small museum full of bit and pieces from the war. It wasn’t as PC as a NZ museums and had things like a soldier’s boot with half his foot still in it (just bones now obviously) and skulls with various calibre bullets imbedded. However, what impressed Mike the most was that they had a dozen or so bullets which had collided in midair and merged into one. The odds of this seem crazy so there must have been a heck of a lot of bullets in the air for them to have so many examples!!
Stop two was Anzac Cove. Just above Anzac Cove was a rock which vaguely looked like the Egyptian Sphinx, the troops named this the Gallipoli Sphinx as they had just been trained in Egypt on the way over.
The Gallipoli Sphinx
Stop three was Long Pine (Australian’s memorial and cemetery)
This was a tunnel connecting two of the many trenches in Gallipoli
This is where the ANZAC dawn service is held on the 25th April each year.
Stop four was the Nek, a high point where a lot of Australian’s lost their lives.
Stop Five, Chunuk Bair (New Zealand's Memorial and Cemetery)
We found this tour to be very informative and moving as it hit home just how many lives were lost and the impact on New Zealand.
DAY TWO
We rose late after a much needed sleep in, getting up early is a bit ruff when you are on holiday!!
We went out and explored Istanbul, walking the streets and taking in the atmosphere.
Our first stop was the Blue Mosque, this was amazing inside with lots of blue ceramics. Women had to be covered, from head to toe.
Next stop Aya sofya (church of holy wisdom) 
What an angel!
From here we walked down to the water front and tried a fish burger which was nothing like we get back home (spoilt from the fish in Aotea).
We then got a little lost and managed to stumble on the spice markets (which we didn’t think would be open as it was Sunday). These were busy markets where all the local turkey people shopped for their food supplies.
The Spice Markets
Here we brought some walnuts – after being shown how to crack these open by a local, we tasted them. . . . . they were very moist and tasted disgusting, well that was Trace’s thoughts, Mike actually quite liked them. After buying these Walnuts without tasting we decided to try the fresh grapes before purchasing them. They were divine so we brought some!
From the spice markets we walked to the Grand Bazaar, unfortunately this was closed. Making our way back to the hotel was a bit of a mission, we got lost several times, there are no street names on any of the streets.
That night we went out for dinner and had a iskender kebap (pita bread on the bottom then marinated meat in gravy with yogurt on top – very healthy – not!) It was very yummy though.
Early night as we needed to be up at 3.30am for our flight to Barcelona.
Aya sofya at night
No comments:
Post a Comment